


The Grim Decennia

by Toryb



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: A story in decades, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, But Also just lots of angst, F/M, Smut, Vampire!Jughead, Witch!Betty, be prepared for angst, descriptions of biting and vampire feeding, lovers to enemies to strained friends with benefits to lovers again
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-14
Updated: 2019-10-24
Packaged: 2020-12-16 07:22:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 22,482
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21032423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Toryb/pseuds/Toryb
Summary: The road to hell is paved with good intentions, and no one knows better than Betty Cooper, who turned her high school sweetheart into a blood sucking vampire. Ever since that night their relationship has felt fractured beyond repair. Every ten years something is thrown their way that seems impossible to overcome. She loves him, she does, but can love really weather any storm?





	1. 1959-1989

**Author's Note:**

> Hello friends, loves! Welcome welcome to another one of my fics. I know what you're thinking "Tori can you fucking finish a fic before you start another one!" and trust me, I totally hear you, but this fic is 100% complete, beta'd and everything, as of me posting the first part of this. SO, it's totally chilling. I plan on posting this first part now and then the second part closer to halloween, since it is the spookiest season of the year and I, Tori, love spooky season. Almost as much as i love jingle bell season.
> 
> This fic, in it's entirety, is a massive 22k. So I'd thank to thank my beta @arsenicpanda, for reading over it like three times to ensure it was tolerable. It's was a lot to undertake so I hope you really enjoy it! This fic was originally intended to be enemies to lovers, but somewhere along the way that sort of got messed up. So I'm sorry! But i hope you like it none the less.
> 
> A fair warning: there are a lot of hurt feelings in this fic. Betty and Jughead do hurt each other because they are hurting. This is about a relationship falling apart and then slowly being built back together again because of love. I just want to warn everyone about that angst before you jump in. If you think I haven't tagged something properly, please just let me know and I'll make sure to add it!!
> 
> At last! I hope you enjoy!!

**Part 1: 1959**

Betty Cooper sat on the edge of Sweetwater River, playing with the ends of her skirt, hoping that the soft scratch the of critalin would keep her distracted long enough that she wouldn’t dwell on waiting. The river was beautiful today. As May slowly began to fade out into the heavy heat of summer, everything about the gentle waves had become an endless supply of comfort. Their gentle babble as they grazed the rocks, the little fish swimming by on their way home, and the wind kicking up water to brush against her ankles were some of her favorites.

She had set up camp near the river’s edge where the rocks mingled with the green from the forest. There were a few leaves that had been shaken loose beside her. Desperate to calm her heart and clear her mind, Betty tangled her hands through the soft blades of grass and gave them a little tug.

Instantly she felt at ease again as Mother Earth kissed her skin and provided her with love. There had always been magic in the Cooper bloodline, but none were quite so as attuned to it as Betty was. From an early age she was gifted, casting spells that even her mother had difficulty with, listening to whispered secrets from the forest that would never dare to be shared with another. It was on this very riverbank that she had cast her first incantation.

_ Mother in Earth, I know this is the start _

_ For this boy to forever have my heart _

_ Promise me that we’ll never be apart _

It had seemed so silly at the time, a little girl’s desperate hope for a fairytale, but Mother must have listened. She got to see Jughead the next day, another chance to fall in love with him again. Every day she offered thanks to the Earth who loved her so dearly. Water, compost, anything that might help Her grow with divine imperfections.

Suddenly all the birds that had previously been singing a little tune to her stopped short and began to flutter off. Had it been any other time, Betty would have been afraid, but she knew from the rumble of the motorbike a few feet off and the way the river kissed her toes that he had finally come to her. The love of her life, her very own prince.

Even as he stood taller now amongst the trees she could see that little boy she had fallen in love with. He was still kissed by the sun with constellations crafted on his skin, a knit cap on his head that looked so strangely disjointed with the leather on his shoulders. Betty hopped to her feet and, without thinking, threw herself into his waiting arms.

They collapsed to the ground, and earth began to stain her so-carefully-ironed skirts. Her mother would have a fit about this, especially if she knew her daughter was out in the forest with the Jones boy again, but Alice didn’t understand the way her young heart sang forth for this boy. He would take her to prom, take her to the courthouse, and then take her right out of town where they would forge their own path of forever. In time, he would come to better understand her witchcraft. For now she simply relished in his kisses as they laughed the way a young couple should.

She felt Mother stir beneath her in delight. Even if Alice didn’t approve, she knew that the Earth did, that a promise had been made and She had every intention of fulfilling it. She loved the way she felt underneath him as a smooth stone pressed into her spine and his hands found purchase just beneath her petticoats. He kissed her until her breath left her body.

Underneath her, the ground shifted, opening up and sprouting blossoms that had no place amongst the wilting summer wildflowers. They sprung from her fingertips and pushed off her boy’s cap until it fell with a thud on her chest. She pulled back laughing when she felt them begin to weave together into a crown more befitting her prince. His leather was crumpled in a pile near the rest of their soon-to-be-forgotten past: pom poms, perfect leather shoes, and a Serpent patch that would be packed into boxes as relics of a hasty youth.

“Mother’s happy you came, Jughead,” Betty teased, pulling her hands back so she didn’t risk tangling his hair in the vines. They slowly began to recede back into their slumbering places beneath the Earth.

“I always come.”

His words echoed in her mind like the sweet vibrations after a thunderstorm. It was the truth. No matter what, he would always come to her, their hearts bound by much more than a child’s magic wish. This was love in its purest form. They were two souls singing out in perfect harmony.

“I know you do. I just…I’ve been worried. I keep hearing whispers about the Ghoulies, and you know how much it scares me. I hate how you have to be wrapped up in all of that. You don’t deserve it.” She spoke as tenderly as she could to him as not to break the gentle fragility of his almost-worried mind. She wanted to be a tether to return him home, not another reason to fret. 

Jughead Jones had been in the Southside Serpents for as long as he had been alive. For eighteen years he had been thrust into the role of Prince, one he neither enjoyed nor cared to have. And still that burden was his to bear. He stumbled through his days with heavy shoulders and a clouded mind. 

Lately, the tensions between the Serpents and a fellow gang, the Ghoulies, had gotten worse. Even on the Northside she was hearing rumors of a brewing gang battle. Fear settled deep in her heart every time she passed by the hastily slamming locker of a resident gossip. There was no magic in the world that would keep this inevitability at bay. She had prayed for so long that it would wait, that everything would wait until they were on the back of his motorbike riding out to the city limits, and no one would dare to pull him back into a war, not when there was so much promise in his mind.

Now she knew for sure that the end was coming closer. Every breath she took felt labored, like Mother was warning her of disaster clung in the air. She tried to bring him into another kiss, a comfort, a reminder that for now he was here and so wonderfully in her arms. But when she brought them closer he pulled away again.

“We can’t.”

_ We could. _

But Betty simply nodded, smiling as best she could despite the pain of rejection. “I know. I know. Not yet. Not yet, but soon. You promised by prom.”

They had made a pact, a vow that they would keep apart as best they could until the Ghoulies were dealt with. But with every passing day she could hardly take the pain of separation, of pretending like they were not meant to be, of batting her eyelashes at boys and ignoring the way the other girls tried to catch his gaze. He wanted to protect her, and she complied despite it all. Finally they had compromised. Prom was so close to the end of the year, a few weeks of being open could hardly put her in that much trouble, even if he didn’t completely trust her magic to keep her safe.

“By prom.” Jughead gently cupped her cheeks, pressing his lips against the worried lines in her forehead, whispering sweet things she couldn’t quite make out but warmed her nonetheless. “I wanted you to come so we could talk.”

Worried, Betty frowned, tangling their hands together. “What do we need to talk about? Is it the Ghoulies? Is something happening?”

She could tell by the look on his face that she had guessed right. Worry immediately welled up in her chest. The Ghoulies. Of course it was them. Of course that had forced Jughead into an even tighter corner than he was already in, and the Serpents would no doubt be planning some sort of retaliation. They were on the precipice of something. She could feel it with every breath she took. Something was coming, and it tasted foul.

“Tell me the truth, Juggie. Please. I can’t take any more secrets between us.”

One had already threatened to tear them apart. Betty hadn’t expected him to take the news of her magic well; for a man as practical as him, it had been downright terrifying to witness the way the Earth reached out to her and obeyed her simplest of whims. He had almost fainted and backed himself into a corner, begging for more time to process everything. Eventually, with time and a few more practical displays, he had come to be utterly enthralled with her abilities. They had survived so much already, she refused to let a gang war be their undoing.

“We’re going to war,” he said finally, so softly that if it hadn’t been for the wind catching his words, she might not have ever heard them. “Tomorrow night. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner, I just found out when I got home from school. My dad pulled me aside and told me that the Ghoulies agreed to a fight, and it’ll probably be the last one there is. I don’t know what’s going to happen. Even if we win, I might get hurt, or someone else will and I’ll have to run from the cops. Betty, this isn’t the kind of life you should have to be a part of. You’re so much brighter than all this chaos. No matter what way it shakes out, I’m going to end up dragging you down with me.”

She cut him off with a kiss, pulling him so tightly that their chests pressed together and she could hear the way their hearts beat in time. “No one, nothing will ever take you away from me Jughead Jones. Whatever war is being raged, you are going to survive it, take me to prom, graduate, and get the hell out of this good-for-nothing town with me. I might be brighter, but you’re better. This little place can’t contain how brilliant you are. It was never meant to. So they’re trying to drag you away kicking and screaming, but they won’t do it. I won’t let them.”

Tears soaked through her sweater like raindrops of sorrow that she could feel on her skin as Betty held him to the crook of her neck. His arms were strong around her waist, warm and desperate for something to bind him to the Earth. She would be his tether without questions.

“I’m scared,” he admitted. “I’m scared of dying.”

“Mother can’t have you yet. I’m not finished with you.”

They stayed like that until the air turned cold and the wind began to bite at her nose. No doubt Alice would be sending out a search party soon to make sure Betty hadn’t gotten herself lost in the woods again. (The last time they had found her she had been curled up in a blanket of flowers, no doubt a gift from the Earth to keep her warm.) Jughead pulled away and grasped his jacket tight before wrapping it around her shoulders. She was about to protest but he shook his head.

“It’s my promise. That I’ll come back to you. I have an extra, but this one’s my favorite. If you have it, then I have to take you to prom, right?”

Betty grinned at the sweetness of his words, the gesture behind his actions, and nodded. “I’ll be waiting for you Jughead. Always.”

They parted with one last bruising kiss. As she listened to the howl of his motorcycle in the wind, she could still feel the way the sensitive skin of her lips tingled with desire. They were soulmates. No amount of human meddling would ever keep them apart.

“It’s better to be safe than sorry,” she whispered, gathering a few things from the ground as she made her way home.

Alice was just as frantic as Betty had feared, and it took nearly an hour of promises to get her to finally allow her daughter to retire to bed. Exhausted from emotions, she quickly changed into her night clothes and locked the door before gathering the ingredients and putting them beside her cauldron. They were all fresh, which made the best sort of magic. Slowly, she stripped away the thorns from the roses and crushed them with her mortar and pestle. They mixed beautifully with the acorns and clovers she had plucked from her personal collection.

She counted four leaves and threw them into the boiling water, dragging it until she was seated perfectly under the glow of the moonlight. Her whole being began to vibrate with power. Strength, safety, hope. She channeled her emotions into intentions. Without them, a spell of this caliber would never work. Finally, when everything had fallen into place and every nerve ending was on fire, Betty began to speak.

_ Strong of heart and strong of mind _

_ The man I want so desperately to be mine _

_ Insatiable, beautiful, kind, and brilliant _

_ Our love is nowhere near through yet _

_ Mother please don’t let him perish tomorrow night _

_ Not even in the morning sun’s early light _

_ I beg now for endless years _

_ Until that time comes I’ll shed no tears. _

Ripping up the paper she had written the spell onto, Betty tossed it into the water and watched it slowly begin to disintegrate. Smoke rose in plumes that twisted in the air before flowing out the open window. But she needed more, something more powerful to ensure that the spell would work. Taking a deep breath of determination, she curled her fingers tight until the blood began to weep from her wounds. A few drops into the brew should be enough for Mother to know her sincerity, just how much she was willing to give for this magic to work.

She let the cauldron simmer for a few more minutes before giving it a gentle shake and pulling it off the flames. Alice never really liked when she performed magic in the house, so Betty quickly tried to get rid of the evidence. The brew went down the drain, and she quickly patched up her hand, already planning that tomorrow she would claim an unhappy accident occurred at school.

As Betty crawled in between her soft sheets, she knew that sleep would not come easily these next two days as she lay awake and worried about the wellbeing of her love. He would survive. He had to.

School was a torturous affair. He was not lingering by her locker in the hallway so they could share a whispered. She missed the warmth of their secret embraces and the way he always kept his eyes watchful for her every movement. It was crushingly lonely without his presence. 

But the passage of time brought nothing but fear. The day he was supposed to return to school she waited anxiously by the gates as a few fellow Serpents pulled up. She stood there, frozen with fear, until one of them came close to her side. She was sure the rest of the school was wondering what business Good Girl Betty Cooper might have with the snakes, but when she felt that gentle touch on her shoulder from Toni, she knew something was wrong.

“Jughead’s missing,” she said softly. “No body or anything. He was there that night and then suddenly no one can find him. But we’re looking everywhere, Betty. I promise. No one’s stopping until we find him.”

She didn’t remember falling to her knees, didn’t remember crying out so loudly that some of her fellow River Vixens rushed to her side. Jughead was missing, her heart, her other half, was nowhere to be found. There was an emptiness inside of her, a hollow pit of hope that maybe he would stumble onto her doorstep at any moment and reveal his clever plot for their escape.

Eating became a chore. Over the next week, no matter how many spoonfuls of soup Alice offered her, she refused to open her mouth. None of it made sense. She would have felt if Jughead died, if something unthinkable was happening to him. But instead there was nothing. No pain, no strength, just an emptiness impossible to describe.

Finally, her parents were forced to go back to their jobs at the Register. Schoolwork began piling up higher and higher, threatening to collapse from her nightstand and drown in her English essays and fraction homework.

_ Good _ , Betty thought bitterly. At least an end would mean reuniting with her love.

It was late, near midnight, with her parents out hunting some sort of lead they promised would be fruitful for the next edition of their floundering paper. The slow inevitable death of radio, death of her love. There was nothing left within her but the slowly decaying, fleshy mass she had once called a heart.

When the doorbell rang, she was half tempted to ignore whoever was at the door. The local Avon lady shouldn’t be coming around so late. Perhaps it was a drunken boy from school, determined to woo her with miserable words and wilting flowers. But what if it were the Serpents, with updates to the whereabouts of Jughead? No amount of scrying had helped her locate him, but perhaps mortal means were proving to be effective.

She pulled herself from bed and slowly made her way to the door. The pounding was getting worse, louder and more incessant, like nails being driven right into the soft tissue of her brain. Betty wanted to throw open the door and give them a lashing, but when she saw who was on the other side, the only thing she could do was weep and cling tightly to the metal handle to prevent herself from collapsing in relief.

Jughead Jones was standing there bathed in the flickering yellow of her porch light, looking like he had crawled his way out of the ground. There was blood everywhere, coagulated and brown, but some spots bright and fresh, especially around his mouth. His eyes were black, and when he opened his mouth to speak, she saw the protrusion of his canines, elongated so dramatically it nearly frightened her. A vampire. A mistake. A spell gone wrong.

“Betty…” his voice cracked. “Am I a monster now?”

He collapsed in her arms, and she held on tight, praying that she could be the one to piece her broken boy back together again. If anyone was the monster, it was her.

  
  


**Part 2: 1969**

Absence makes the heart grow fonder. Thomas Haynes Bayly popularized that saying in his book  _ Isle of Beauty _ . As Betty scrolled through his words, curiously tracing her fingers along them again and again, she wondered what kind of fool he had been. There are many types of absence: absence of the body, absence of the mind, and absence of the heart. For the past ten years the last had been the most painful for her.

The night Jughead had stumbled to her house covered in blood, everything had changed. Her spell had worked, but her intentions must have been muddled, unclear, and Mother had taken it into her own hands to preserve his life at any cost. Even if it turned him into a predator of the night. He was, for all intents and purposes, the very best version of himself. Insatiable hunger, a love of the night, strong, fierce, and tied to her until the end of their days. They were trapped together now, even as with every passing year her love pulled further and further away.

_ Strong of heart and strong of mind _

_ The man I want so desperately to be mine _

_ Insatiable, beautiful, kind, and brilliant _

_ Our love is nowhere near through yet _

Being bound to her magic forced them together, masquerading as the perfect happy couple for all their neighbors. No one knew that behind closed doors they did little but argue late into the night, throw hurtful words that she never meant until someone left for the evening.

All she had ever wanted was to make him happy. To be with him. To love him. And now she had ruined it all. Two lovers trapped together in a fate worse than Romeo and Juliet. Mother had hurt her, scorned her hopes and dreams, and her magic had been damaged like that connection. She had such little trust now in the earth that it was difficult to cast even the simplest of magics, let alone reverse what she had done to Jughead. Every day that she felt him pull back a little more, her connection to Mother wavered. Life was crumbling, and she had no idea where she might land.

Her magic had saved him, yes, and continued to keep him alive despite any harm he might have suffered. Apparently he had been stumbling around during one of the nights and been run over by a truck. The metal was damaged, but he stood there without a scratch on him. There was very little she could get out of him about what happened during that time, especially now, but this she knew to be true based on the few reports the newspaper had printed in the aftermath.

They were forced to leave Riverdale the day after her graduation. Keeping him in the Cooper family basement was impossible, especially when her parents were growing more and more agitated by his presence.

_ He’s a monster, Elizabeth, an abomination. We should just put him out of his misery with a shotgun blast to the head,  _ her father had said.

_ Really, Betty, isn’t it time to let an old flame die? _ Even now Alice’s voice echoed in her ears. 

_ A graduation present _ , Polly had promised, before throwing Jughead out into the sun.  _ So you can be free of your past failures. _

But even that had proved useless, only agitating him more and throwing him into a fit of rage that nearly destroyed the entire home and the occupants within.

_ Mother please don’t let him perish tomorrow night _

_ Not even in the morning sun’s early light _

Those first few years had been difficult as they worked with intense dedication to get his instincts under control. There were many nights she would wake up to him attached to her neck, her leg, her arm, drinking as much as he could in frantic desperation. It had been her idea, free feeding to keep his hunger at bay while he could barely control himself. She would let him drink until the weakness got too much and she would gently push him off. When she pushed, he would move without question. Then he would collapse against her in a fit of despair and cry the rest of the night until he had exhausted himself completely. Some days he sat catatonic and watched the wall, humming an old lullaby he would sing his sister to help her sleep.

Everyone thought he was dead now. There had been a funeral, a miserable affair where Betty had sat beside the Joneses and the Serpents and mourned for a loss she had caused them. She wept with reckless abandon and begged for a way to turn back time, to right her wrongs. But Mother never delivered.

They ran as quick as they could to keep away from prying eyes. And now they were here, seated in the midwest without any sort of comforts they had known before. The heat was unbearable sometimes, and the weather even worse. Betty had difficulty growing a garden, and Jughead hated the sun. But at least they had land, a farm, pigs for slaughter to give him something to eat without raising too much suspicion.

Betty closed her book with a snap, setting it aside so she could reach for one of the wounds on her wrist. Bite marks, fangs so obviously indented in her skin from when he had been so insatiable. For nearly half a decade they made it work, letting him feed on her when he hungered the most. But now things were rockier and he never seemed to want to feed. She doubted the wounds would ever properly heal, even when witches were known to heal quickly and live significantly longer lives than the average human. She still looked as young as him, maybe a year older, but not enough to cause curiosity from the neighbors yet. She kept the wounds hidden with sweaters even in the sweltering heat. That gave many of the neighbors more pause than an actual bite mark might, but there was little else she could do to keep them safe.

She checked the clock again. He was nearly an hour late coming home, not that she expected it to be much different. Playing husband and wife meant many mundane tasks that felt bizarre to participate in. She still needed to eat, and a trip to the grocery store could take hours. Even just driving out from their backwoods dirt roads gave him the privacy he so often claimed he needed. Still, she missed him when he was gone, and grew antsy when it took hours for his return. There was always that fear that the tenuous rope of the spell would break and something might happen to him.

Biting back her tears, Betty went to the fridge, pulling out leftovers of the pot pie for herself and a fresh blood packet for him. He was being stubborn as of late, lying that he wasn’t hungry or giving other excuses as to why he couldn’t eat. She couldn’t remember the last time he had even fed from her, let alone one of their pigs. Hopefully tonight she would get him to eat.

Jughead returned from his trip to the grocery store looking worse than when he had left. His features were sunken, pupils blown wide with hunger. The normally clear blue of his eyes had been swallowed whole by darkness. She could fall into the suffocating depression. It was like wading through thick and sticky tar to an unfathomable conclusion.

The groceries were set on the counter without so much as a hello, brown paper bags crinkling as Betty gingerly began plucking at the contents. Most of it was for her, since human food had lost all nutritional value for Jughead after the spell had turned him. Still, she spotted a few fresh cookies from the bakery and smiled. Even magic couldn't take away his love of chocolate macadamia. They didn’t need much thanks to the self-sustaining nature of their farm, but sometimes the escape of the supermarket was good for them.

“You look hungry,” she finally said after all the goods had been put away in their cupboards. “I butchered a pig earlier so there’s some fresh blood in the fridge for you.”

Betty tried to smile, but she knew it wavered, could feel the corners of her mouth start to shake. One wrong breeze and she might feel her perfectly constructed persona crack. No more sweet and devoted farm wife, but instead the shattered remains of a porcelain doll.

“I’m not hungry.” Even then she could see the way he swallowed against the grit in his throat, Adam's apple bobbing with obvious discomfort as he tried to work through the hunger on his own.

“You are,” Betty implored. “And if you refuse to eat from me, at least eat something else. I know pig isn’t your favorite, but it’s good for you. You need to do something so you’re eating.”

“You mean go on a murderous rampage across the state like the abomination I am? Break into people’s homes and open their necks? Bathe myself in their blood and drink until I’m drunk on it?”

It was no secret that Jughead hated what he had become, what she had made him, but each word felt like the blade of a knife plunging right into her heart. Over and over and over again until she could practically taste the iron of blood in her lungs. This was her curse as much as it was his.

Biting back tears, she shook her head and steeled her resolve. “That’s not what I said and you know it. I just told you, there’s blood in the fridge. I’m not telling you to go running around town and risk getting caught.”

“And I told you, I don’t want it. I would rather starve. At least then I wouldn’t walk through the town looking at strangers like they’re a damn angus burger on a platter for me.”

“If you would stop being stubborn and just drink from me, that wouldn’t be a problem,” she countered, frustration building. Why didn’t he understand? She had hurt him, and she would suffer the consequences to make him happy again, to keep him healthy and safe. “You know it’s easier to be out in public when you aren’t starving. What’s got you so stubborn today?”

He scoffed and broke off a part of the cookie, stuffing it in his cheeks like one of the rats they had chased out of the attic earlier this week. She could tell from the way he bit his tongue and shivered that he was far from satisfied. Everything ached just watching him suffer. How could Mother betray them like this? A love that She had supposedly blessed? What mistake had Betty made that was so grave to result in this kind of suffering?

“What’s got me so stubborn? What’s got me so angry? Betty have you looked at a calendar lately? Or do you not remember the day  _ you _ cursed me to be a vampire? The day I woke up and lost my entire family, had to pretend like I was dead and never see them again, never telling them what happened to me. Is it so unimportant to you that you just forgot about it?”

She felt them again, stinging her eyelids. Tears. Disgusting, dangerous little demons. Without thinking, Betty reached behind and fumbled around in the sink, closing her fingers when she felt the bite of the kitchen knife’s blade in her skin. It was instantaneous. She drug it quick across her open palm and watched red pool in her fate lines before slipping through her fingers. It splattered onto the white tile ground like a demented mosiac of suffering.

Hunger took over and Jughead’s gaze snapped towards where she stood, fangs elongated as he pounced on her. Warm saliva coated her skin and made her shiver as he drug his teeth against the open wound. The sharp point of his teeth made her twitch as she watched his whole body shiver and shake with delight as instinct forced him to indulge. Already, she could see the brightness return to his skin as his the black of his pupils finally began to recede.

He kissed up her arm to the pulse of her wrist and let his teeth sink in. The bite hurt less than it had the first few times. Scar tissue, tough and tight, had formed in beautiful crescents on her pale skin, but his teeth cut through with ease. Betty groaned and clenched her other hand tight while she waited for his saliva to replace pain with euphoria. Like a carefully constructed predator, vampires were adept at lulling their prey into a state of ecstasy to keep them from attempting escape.

Her head swam with warm comfort as she slouched back against the counter. She raised her other hand and gently began running it through his soft black curls as she whispered words of encouragement. The perfectly pink apron she had been wearing was stained red with her blood.

After a few moments, she finally began to register the gentle splash of tears against her skin. Jughead was crying. He clung to her like a newborn child as he drank from her veins. Seeing him in such pain was enough to break her so carefully constructed flood gates.

Betty could not weep the way she craved. Every drop that fell from the flutter of her eyelashes cute through his skin like acid. He hissed in pain as the tears bubbled bright blisters on his skin. They were damned to this suffering.

_ I beg now for endless years _

_ Until that time comes I’ll shed no tears. _

To be kept emotionless was a slow insidious rot of her soul. For fear of his pain she kept her sorrow locked away tight. Only two tears fell that day, two tears too many, though the wounds would take weeks to heal even after he nearly drank her dry.

This was their burden. Their curse.

How could Mother forsake them so?

**Part 3: 1979**

Betty and Jughead moved out of their sleepy farming town in the early 1970s. There was only so long they could spend in one place, even all the way out in the boondocks, before the neighbors grew suspicious about their perpetually young appearances. They rented out the property to another young couple, claiming that the farm had been in their family for generations but they needed to head out west for better weather. Most of the residents knew about Jughead’s “ailment,” the condition that kept him from being out too much in the son. The claim that he was sickly was easier to substantiate than another lie about how he never left the house in the daylight without becoming incredibly weak. 

They packed up the little they needed and said goodbye to the few friends they had made, who wished them luck and sent them on their way. California was a place of the strange and bizarre. While the access to blood would be more limited than it had been on the farm, the rise in crime meant that there were dealers more than willing to give first and never ask questions. Besides, who would have trouble trusting the sweet hospital volunteer Betty Cooper, with her shining, delicate smile and her detailed stories about true love.

Life was not so easy for them, but it was manageable for a few years. Their home was far from quiet, neighbors rowdy with records playing late into the night, which drowned out the ever increasing fights they had. The small rift had crumbled its way into a chasm, and Betty constantly feared there would be no bridge large enough to mend this fracture.

When she heard from one of her coworkers about the string of assaults popping up in the city’s underground, no one hardly batted an eye beside her. They laughed when she grew pale, patting her shoulder as they blamed her sweet, small town sensibilities. One of the nurses asked her to sit and offered her a drink of juice to help calm her nerves.

“How’re they being assaulted?” she asked, eyes wide with fear.

One of her friends, Trula, who worked in the psych ward, patted her shoulder gently. She was a nice woman who had grown up living in city life. She hardly batted an eye when the worst of the worst came in. Drug overdoses made her curious, and any case that seemed out of the ordinary had her sniffing around.

“Neck wounds, loss of blood, depleted cognitive ability for the day. My neighbor’s been claiming vampires,” she laughed, waving off the idea. “But you know she’s crazy. Who believes in that sort of stuff anymore? I know it looks strange, but people in this city are weird. Of course if you take an icepick to someone’s neck they’ll lose a lot of blood and be foggy. They tend to be okay after a few transfusions. The police are absolutely baffled and--”

The older nurse shushed her, gesturing to Betty’s shaken frame in the seat. “You’re scaring the poor dear, Ms. Twyst. I swear you’ve got no common sense. It’s alright, Elizabeth. You’re shaking like a leaf. Why don’t you go home to your husband? I’m sure a few hugs could help turn your mood around. Don’t think much of it. It’s only vagabonds I’ve heard being targeted, and not one has died yet. You’ll be safe and sound.”

After a few ‘thank you’s for letting her leave early, Betty exited the hospital. She didn’t take the bus like she promised her friends she was going to. Instead she turned right, hoping that a nice long walk might help clear her head. Unfortunately, it doesn’t do anything but make her stressed. There are no other vampires in their area, at least not that she had gotten a read on after a tracking spell. It was purposeful, to make sure that any of their attacks wouldn’t draw curiosity to her poor sickly husband. But there’s no other explanation. He’s got to be the one going on a free blood rampage. Every bite was going to increase public suspicions. Their anonymity was at risk.

It was still early enough in the day that Jughead wouldn’t have risked leaving the house. Everything seemed so perfect on the outside. A small garden out front, a three bedroom house for “when they finally decided to have children.” At least that’s what they told the neighbors. No one needed to know they slept in different rooms. No one needed to know they were the furthest thing from a happy marriage. Everything needed to be perfect to ensure that their anonymity and safety were kept in tact. These late night feedings on strangers were risking that. The last thing Betty wanted to do was pack up everything and move across the country again.

She opened the door and shouted for him, “Jughead! Jughead, we need to talk!”

The house was old enough that everything went creak in the night. A few of the floorboards were loose, the cabinets half painted from where he had promised to help renovate. The counter was finally finished, which in some ways was good news. It meant he was feeling well enough, full enough, to walk around the house without feeling weak. It was a far cry from the haunted shadow he had been a decade ago.

And yet, something was so obviously wrong. Her Jughead would not go around hurting people like this. At least she knew he hadn’t killed anyone, but it was only a matter of time until he lost control, wasn’t it? Vampires were not often known for their impulse control, and with every year she could see him slipping more and more away from her and into the darkness. His cry of monster was becoming a steadily self-fulfilling prophecy.

“I’m coming, Betty, just give me a minute.”

She heard the shuffle of his feet against the flooring and the heavy thump of his door slamming against the back wall. Sometimes it was still difficult for him to grasp his strength.

  
It was a surprise to see him in nothing but his boxers. It reminded her of the times before the curse, when they would enjoy their time at the lake. The first time he had ever kissed her they had stripped down into near nothing to go for a swim, laughing and splashing under the sun’s heavy rays. Some days she would still have dreams about the soft press of his lips against hers and the shiver that ran down her spine. He looked exactly like he had before. Whatever scars that had been there before had been unaffected by the turning, and she wanted so desperately to reach out and hold him close.

But right now she was angry, hurt, offended that he would jeopardize both their lives. “What do you think you’re doing? Running around and drinking from strangers? That’s dangerous! What if people start to get suspicious of you, of us? What happens if someone puts the pieces together?”

“What pieces are they going to get? That vampires are real? Betty, no one has believed in any of that stuff for decades. They didn’t even believe in it when we were still in high school. Besides, I’m just going with the flow of the 70s. Free sex, free drugs, free feedings. Where’s the harm in that?”

He sauntered over to the refrigerator, pulling out a blood packet. He sinks his teeth in, and Betty can’t help but shiver as she watches his fangs penetrate the plastic. In a sick way she almost craves that touch again. He hasn’t given it to her in years, and her skin itches from the lack of contact. It might not have been much, but it was something to ground her, to ground them in their togetherness. At least with a bite she felt like he needed her. Now, she’s not sure that if it weren’t for the curse that kept them in close proximity of one another, he wouldn’t run off into the horizon just to be away from her.

“Where’s the harm? Jughead, you know the harm! You don’t know where those people have been. We don’t know how human sickness can affect you. What if you can get really sick from them too?”

“You’re overthinking things.” He sighed and tossed the blood bag away. He was so much healthier than he had been before, but knowing how it came about made her shiver.

“Are you at least being safe? Is everyone,” she paused, swallowing thick, “Is everyone consenting to it?”

His face contorted in disgust as he turned away from her. “Of course it is. I offer to pay them if they let me drink. I’m not out to become a complete monster. I’m just hungry.”

“So why won’t you drink from me anymore?”

Maybe she hadn’t realized how much it had been hurting her, knowing that she was not the one who gave him blood. It made her heart ache every time she imagined another person with shaking knees as they caved under the unexpected pleasure of a vampire bite. That Jughead was giving them the same sort of euphoria as he had given her made her frustrated beyond belief. In her heart, he was still hers, forever and then some.

What else had he done with them? Realistically, she knew that was none of her business. Despite their little house play, they were not married, even if the rings on their fingers gave the neighbors that illusion. What they each did in their spare time no longer belonged to the other person. But that didn’t mean it didn’t hurt imagining him giving another person what they had promised so many years ago to each other.

“It’s not like that,” Jughead said finally, refusing to meet her eyes. “Don’t you think I’ve had plenty from you already? I saw how weak it was making you. I can’t have you dying on me. Who knows what happens to the magic then.”

Her fits curled tight, nails biting through her skin. She knew he could smell the blood in the air, but this time he was satiated enough not to claw at her like a rapid animal. Sometimes she wished he would. Just to be in his arms again would be worth the mauling. She would let him swallow her whole.

“I’m fine now. I’ll be fine. I just…” She didn’t know what she wanted to say, if there was anything to say that didn’t sound absurd even in the echoes of her own mind. All the words in her brain were discombobulated as her heart tried frantically to put a name to a feeling.

Maybe she was jealous.

“Are you seeing someone else?”

What a strange question to ask. It took him by surprise just as it had taken her, and for a moment they simply stared at each other. Sometimes Betty missed the farm life, or the sleepy little town of Riverdale. She had planted roots so easily there, but it was hard to find a connection to Mother here within the concrete jungle. Even the plants on the windowsill never grew to their full potential. She felt like the wilting succulent, aching for water as the little stored in her roots slowly began to run dry.

When no answer came, Betty turned away from him, biting her tongue until she could taste blood to keep the tears at bay. Her body shook with misery, and she wanted nothing more than to throw off her bell bottoms and sit in the scalding hot shower until her skin melted away.

Just as she was ready to run as far away as she could, she felt his hand close firmly around her wrist, pulling her towards him. They were inches apart now, so close to it was impossible not to imagine what it might be like to kiss him again. His lips were always so chapped, but she remembered the roughness against her skin, the delightful nip of his teeth as they laughed on the riverbed.

“What did I promise you?”

She swallowed, throat tight as she replied, “That we would be each other’s first. On prom night.”

“When have you ever known me to break a promise, Betty? Blood isn’t sex. Sex isn’t blood.”

It all happened so fast after that. Hands, hearts, minds all singing out together as one towards the empty void. His hands were so soft on her skin, tracing along the curve of her spine as their mouths fought for dominance in a hungry kiss. She loved the way her tongue felt dragging against the sharp points of his fangs, and when he bit down just a bit to taste, her knees nearly gave out from underneath her.

This kiss was not like theirs had been so early on in their youth. This kiss was not the same promise of forever they had shared the day she had cast her spell. This was something much more feral.

Jughead pushed her against the wall, and she could hardly even hear the way the paintings and pictures clattered to the ground over the ringing in her ears. Something like glass smashed, but all she could feel was his mouth on her neck, his hands under her shirt as he squeezed at the soft flesh of her chest. She moaned in delight and pressed hard against him, rocking her hips to find some sort of relief from the heat coiling in her core.

In the back of her mind she could hear Mother singing again, pleased about their reunion. Betty tangled her hands in his hair and gave a soft tug, panting as she pushed his head down towards her chest. There was something otherworldly about the way his mouth felt on the rosy pink pebbles of her nipples. His fangs sunk down, and she screamed out in ecstasy, shaking in delight.

“Yes…Juggie, yes…” she cooed as his hips pressed roughly into hers. The thin cotton of his boxers did nothing to hide his erection.

They had stumbled their way to this a few times before, usually in the Earth’s warm embrace, away from prying eyes. But they had sworn prom night would be their first, the start of forever. Prom night never came, and now, nearly two decades later, they were finally fulfilling that promise.

It wasn’t until they made their way to her bedroom that Betty became apprehensive about what came next. She tried to remember all the quiet chatter from the locker room, girls whispering how they’d had a wild ride in the back of their boyfriends’ hot rods at makeout point. Even some of her older friends at the hospital had mentioned sex a time or two, though they always teased her about the way she blushed. None of them knew she had been a virgin for nearly 38 years.

He was staring down at her looking just as fearful as she felt, and for a moment she was positive this entire moment of fantasy would come crashing down around them. She prepared herself for the impact, the denial, the quick shove as he ran as far away as he could get from her. But instead, she felt the gentle brush of his fingers against her lips.

“Don’t be scared,” he whispered. “I don’t know what I’m doing either.”

Such simple words had lulled her back into a moment of security. No matter what, he was still her Jughead, and her world would revolve around him until the day Mother called for her to return to the earth. Maybe they would meet again in a future life as well.

Bety kicked off her jeans and shifted just a little as he stared down at her nearly naked frame. She was nervous to be showing him so much of her, to be showing anyone this much. His fingers traced down until he hooked around her underwear and slowly began dragging them off. Her toes curled when the cold air hit her cunt, and she shivered with excitement.

“You’re beautiful,” he took a shaky breath, words muffled by the length of his fangs. “Jesus Christ. I, um…I don’t really know what to do.”

At least that was a relief. They were both clueless, and this, like many things in life, was something they could stumble into together. She kissed him softly. “I don’t either. But I know I like how you feel on me. So touch me, Juggie, just touch me.”

He obeyed her wishes, and with caution his fingers slipped inside her folds. Betty gasped as her body angled to chase after his touch. It was too intense, too strong, but every brush of his fingers was brutal against her spongey insides, sending her higher and higher and higher. The crash would be inevitably painful, and still she craved for release.

It never came. Before she could feel the tight clench of her body, he had removed his fingers. She let out a frustrated whine and pulled him closer to her again.

“I want you to bite me,” Betty said softly, flickering her eyes up at him. “When we start...doing it, I want you to bite me. Please?”

Jughead seemed conflicted for a moment, before finally nodding, agreeing to her request. “Okay. Okay.”

They fumbled their way out of the rest of their clothes, a small pile forming at the foot of her bed. She was thankful that the 70s were so forgiving in terms of grooming and he didn’t seem bothered by the dark curls of hair. When he dragged his cock along her folds, all that insecurity faded away.

He paused, eyes going wide. “Betty… is there some type of supernatural condom or diaphragm we should be using right now?”

“I’m, well, I’m not sure. I don’t know much about the reproductive health of,” she couldn’t bring herself to say vampires, “people like you. But you were turned from a human, so I think everything’s the same, and my doctor gave me a prescription for the pill when he found out I was married.”

“And you’re sure that thing’s safe?” Even now he was worried, and it made her heart flutter with excitement. How she had missed the gentleness of his love, the tenderness of his adoration. “I heard they’re making copper IUDs now. I don’t know, it sort of worries me that you’re putting all that stuff in your body.”

Betty knew that witches could get pregnant, with a human or a supernatural creature’s child, but the reproductive habits of vampires were a bit more of a mystery. They were secretive creatures, who mostly kept to themselves and didn’t like the watchful eye of witches too often. The only way she had heard about reproduction was by biting someone and nearly draining them, but that had never been done to children as far as she had known. People who cursed them with immortal lives were monsters in the highest form.

Maybe she was one of them. He had been a child too, hadn’t he? So young and innocent, ready to explore the world. And that had all been taken away because she feared she would lose him. She was just the same as them.

She pushed away her thoughts when she felt him on her again, tongue dragging along the pulse of her neck as he salivated against her skin. The simple action made her flutter with desire, and her legs wrapped tight against him.

“It’s safe. Just… just please, Juggie. Please, I want you.”

It hurt at first, the stretch of his cock inside of her cunt. Everything ached, and her body was alight with fire. She wanted to tell him to stop, to push him away and weep under the safety of her covers, but he stopped and let her adjust. After a few moments, she could breathe again. He felt good. She was stretched and full of him, of Jughead, and it felt nearly divine.

After a few attempts at finding a pace that worked well for them, sometimes it was too hard, sometimes it was too soft, sometimes he slipped out of her and they had to dance their way back together. 

He came with a grunt, but she was left feeling anything but hollow. Her friends at the hospital had mentioned this, the husband coming without the wife, so it was no surprise that they had hardly lasted. Still, the soreness between her thighs was good. The stickiness felt nice. A reminder that he had her, that they were together even for just a moment.

Jughead pulled back and pressed a kiss to her forehead. His body was shiny with sweat, a soft smile on his face. He leaned down and bit her hard, still buried deep inside her. The surprise sent her spiraling as she tumbled down from the great precipice into her climax. Ecstasy. He had given it to her.

They lay together until her eyes grew tired. She didn’t know how long this would last, and she didn’t want to miss a moment of their union as she traced circles on his cold skin. He didn’t speak, but every breath tickled her skin. It was habit more than necessity that kept him doing the most human of things.

When she was half asleep, she felt the other side of the bed dip with his knees as he rose to his feet. Betty turned to the side, curious as she clung desperately to his hand. Jughead kissed the wounds on her palm softly.

“Go back to bed, Betty. You’re exhausted,” he whispered softly, pressing a kiss to her forehead. “I’ll come back to bed soon, I promise.”

He didn’t.

**Part 4: 1989**

Betty would have thought by the 1980s that living in a house with someone of the opposite sex would be a little less frowned upon than it had for the last few decades, but when they started moving boxes into their new Texas apartment, there were whispers and stares. They ended up agreeing that another decade of marriage wouldn’t be so bad. Jughead had been a little softer to her lately, but sometimes she wondered if that was just the side effects of their frequent nights rolling around under the stars.

The noise complaints would have been the reason they’d had to move if it weren’t for the usual ten years being up.

The neighbors are nice, a little nosy, but that was just how apartment complexes tended to be. It wasn’t too difficult to deal with. Jughead like the vibe of the 1980s, teasing Betty about her larger-than- life curls. A friend from work had even managed to convince her to go in for a perm.

“You look like a poodle.”

Betty rolled her eyes, pulling on the curls. “It’s fashionable, Jughead, people have their hair like this all the time. It’s the same reason you wear those stupid pants.”

“People like these jeans. You’re just jealous because I’m not the human embodiment of a dog.”

That, like many of their arguments, ended with them in bed together again. That was the conclusion of most things these days. Now that they had discovered sex, it was nearly impossible to keep their hands away from each other, as desperation crept in late into the night. Sometimes she woke up with him between her legs, laughing as he slipped in his tongue and traced his letters until her toes curled and she screamed his name out into the heavens.

But he was never there in the morning. The small reconciliation had been met with adjustments to better fit the strange arrangement they found themselves in.

“So your ex-husband that you’re pretending to be your husband so your conservative neighbors don’t judge you, is still the guy that you’re sleeping with because you lost your virginity to him and you have mind blowing sex, but neither of you know what you’re doing to get your shit together. Does that sound like I have it right?”

Josie McCoy worked in the gardening department of their local House Depot by day and sang in a girl group by night. Betty had gone to a few of the Pussycats’ concerts and even bought their debut EP on her walkman. The two had made friends with her frequent visits to the shop, collecting plants to burn or help grow whenever it was time for the changing of seasons. Even an apartment couldn’t keep a witch from living out her nature fantasy.

She was one of only two people in the world who was aware of her and Jughead’s situation, more or less, anyway. She didn’t know that her supposed ex-husband was a creature of the night who fed off of blood. The general assumption was he worked a night shift at a local club and liked to sleep most of the day. That was much easier to digest than the truth of it all.

The other person, Valerie Brown, had learned after trying to set Betty up on a date with her brother, Trev, only to have her show up for what she thought would be a friendly lunch date still wearing her wedding ring. It had been a sweet gesture, but there was no other man in the world for her but Jughead Jones. He was the love of her life. Forever. Even if his affections had faded into something more primal. Whatever he gave, she was willing to take, to absorb like a flower in a drought.

“Yeah, yeah, pretty much.” When summed up like that, it was pretty fucking pathetic. Josie certainly had a way of making someone feel stupid.

“Girl, I say this politely, but what is his damage? Is he blind? Mental? You’re standing right in front of him looking like sex on heels, and he can’t figure out that the ring belongs on permanently?” Josie hummed. “I don’t like it. Time to ditch the dud and come move in with the Pussycats.”

It was a sweet offer, one that made her heart flutter. It was hard, having to leave her friends every ten years, put up high on the neverending list of problems her magic had caused. Nowadays she didn’t do much unless it was for a solstice or to aid a friend in need. She already missed Trula, who still occasionally wrote. She had invited Betty and Jughead to her wedding, but they had to decline. No amount of old age makeup was going to help hide the youthful glow of vampirism.

“Besides, isn’t he younger than you? Like eighteen? He can’t even drink with you when you go out,” Valerie chimed in as she rearranged a group of daylilies.

His aging, or lack thereof, was something Jughead was especially sensitive about. Growing up he had always been a few months her senior, having an early October birthday. But even though the aging of a witch was slow, it was still quicker than nonexistent. When he was stuck perpetually at the end of puberty, she could pull off an ID that said 21 without too much questioning.

“He’s twenty,” she bluffed, looking over at the flowers to keep herself from looking too guilty. “We’ve been in love for a long time. It’s not that weird. I know we’re a little young to be divorced, but sometimes it happens. I think we rushed into marriage.”

“What? Were you expecting?”

“Valerie!” Betty exclaimed. She felt the ends of her ears turn red with embarrassment. She had tried to learn with the times, evolve like the world around her, but there were some 50s sensibilities that she had a hard time shaking. Sex was still a major topic of discomfort, even though Valerie and Josie pushed those limits every day. “Not that it’s any of your business, but no, I wasn’t. We were just in love.”

If Betty closed her eyes she could hear all the plants singing out to her, a beautiful harmony that she missed so much. But ever since Mother’s betrayal, she had no confidence in her magics. The few complicated tricks she managed to cast always ended up in disaster with someone getting hurt. The connection was rockier than ever now, and with every passing day she feared what side effects that might bring to her and Jughead’s predicament. Being a vampire was not ideal, especially as she slowly aged alongside him. There would be one day that she would be too old to stay tethered to him, and she wondered what then would happen.

An especially beautiful group of sunflowers wavered in the late afternoon breeze. It was hotter than hell, a common problem where they were, and Betty longed for the temperate climate of California or the snowy upstate New York. Even the midwest's twisters were preferable to scorching her feet on the blacktop and her flowers wilting when the sun got too high.

Still, there was no harm in adding to her collection. She picked up the girls and set them amongst the less temperamental flowers in her collection. Who would have thought she would have become a succulent collector in her forties.

“And are you still in love?” Josie asked with a raised eyebrow.

It was an easy answer, one she would never have to question. “Yes. Forever. Until the day I die.”

“Then why the fuck are you waiting around here instead of admitting that to him? He’d be a moron not to take you back. It’s not like you guys had a nuclear argument. I’m sure it’ll be an easy fix.”

Betty sighed, shaking her head. “I’m not sure that’s true, Josie. It was definitely nuclear. I don’t know if he’ll ever be able to forgive me for what I did. I thought I was protecting him, doing the right thing, but I didn’t ask first, and it caused so much drama. It’s totally… what’s the opposite of rad?”

“Unrad?” Valerie chimed in from behind a large fern.

“Totally unrad,” she agreed.

Josie reached out and put her hand on her friend's shoulder, giving it a gentle squeeze. She looked good even in the hideously neon orange vest their department was required to wear. Her curls were pulled perfectly tight, and Betty had never seen someone look so good in blue eyeshadow. She was going to have to ask for some beauty tips from her. On more than one occasion, Valerie and Josie had claimed that Betty and her fashion were both “still stuck in the 70s.”

_ More like stuck in the 50s, but point taken. _

“Listen to me. If you love him so much that you’re not even willing to give Trevor Brown, Harvard-bound swim team Trevor Brown, a date, then you’re so head over heels that he’s probably aware of it and just doesn’t know what to do himself. You’re still doing the horizontal mambo in bed together almost every night.”

“Josie! Do you have to phrase it like that?”

“What do you want me to call it? The two step?” she teased. “Have him slip you the hot beef injection? Do the deadly deed? Get off on Paisley?”

Betty groaned, covering her ears. “I can’t hear you. You are totally wigging me out on purpose! How is ridiculing me in public going to make me any more likely to go back home and tell Jug I still want to be with him as more than just a dance partner?”

“It’ll get you to buy your plants and get the hell out of my department. I swear you’re going to end up a crazy old plant lady, which is nothing I have ever heard of before. Tell you what. You can convince your man to be a forever kind of love and you both can get into the show the Pussycats are playing free of charge. Consider it my congratulations for getting your head out of your ass.” Valerie and Josie shared a laugh, high fiving each other as another Cyndi Lauper song came on the radio waves. (As much as Betty enjoyed watching the evolution of music, there were some days she missed the simplicity of the shake, rattle, and roll.)

Once the Pussycats were sure they were finished embarrassing her, Betty finally got them to ring up her plants and free her from the purgatory of the House Depot. Driving home, she couldn’t help but think about what they had said. Maybe Josie was right about her relationship with Jughead, at least to a certain extent. There was so much fear surrounding their lives, and she knew forgiveness would be slowly earned, but maybe they could finally start trying, working their way towards something good. She missed being held in his arms and looking up at the sky to trace all the constellations they knew. They would get so competitive, the winner forced to buy the loser milkshakes from Pops for the next time they met. She would do anything to have that kind of innocence again.

After an entire car ride of arguments, mostly with herself, though there had been one with the bug that landed on her windshield and wouldn’t go away, she finally decided that it was time to have a talk. Both she and Jughead deserved the type of closure that could come from an open and honest conversation. They needed to figure out what they were doing with their lives, the together aspect of it. Sleeping around with him, as amazing as it was, was going to end up hurting her in the long run. She craved to have him, to hold him in her arms and kiss him so hard their knees went weak before playing Scrabble until she fell asleep in the crook of his arm.

“Jughead?” Betty called as she opened the door, two of her plants hanging on her hip while the others sat stuffed inside the box Valerie had helped her pack. “Are you home?”

Sometimes he would be out, feeding before she got home. It was a compromise they had finally agreed upon: some nights he would feed on her, and others he would be allowed to explore the city. He likened it to having your favorite meal every day of forever. Eventually it would start to suck. It was a way to keep things under control. If anyone started to get suspicious, he was willing to go back to a Betty-only diet until it all blew over to avoid a repeat of the “Mass Icepick Assailant” scandal that had happened in California.

She set the plants on the counter and opened up the window so the sun could kiss at the soft yellow petals of her new plant. It shuddered in delight as a small blossom began to bloom. For a moment, Betty was hopeful, excited for the future. Maybe this was Mother’s way of telling her that things were going to turn around for the two of them soon.

“Jug?” she tried again, just to make sure he hadn’t slept in too late.

No answer came, but something about that unsettled her. There was a cold nip in the air, unusual for Texas in the late summer months. She shivered, fear creeping up her spine and turning her blood to ice.

Frantic now, she could feel her heart thundering in her chest. “Jughead? Jughead, please? Please answer me if you’re here.”

The reply she got was not the one she could have ever wanted. There was a moan from the bathroom, door slightly askew. As Betty got closer she noticed the blood on the handle, smeared along the off-white paneling they had gotten into an argument about the week before.

“No. Mother, no!”

She threw open the door to see Jughead curled up on the bathroom floor, blood pooling on the tiles around him. It was impossible to tell where the wound was. Everything was bathed in iron, painting the room crimson. She nearly cried out, nearly dropped to her knees with shaky hands and cried until she collapsed and drowned right beside him. It would be a fitting way to end: a modern day Romeo and Juliet.

Instead, Betty bit the inside of her lip and rolled him onto his back. It was a better way to study him, to see if he was still alive and where the wound was coming from. There was a gash on his stomach, healing slowly as blood seeped out. A large spike had been shoved through his shoulder, wood carved into a fine point that had nearly pierced his heart. Luck. Impossibly wonderful good luck was on their side today. The damage was painful but this, this was something that could be fixed, could be healed, as long as she acted quickly.

“This is going to hurt,” she said softly, grabbing the wash cloth from the sink. It was sticky red too, from where he had obviously tried to stop his own bleeding. But the holy wood made him weak, and with all that blood loss it was impossible for him to get it out all on his own. “Take a deep breath. Hold my hand tight if you have to. I don’t care if you break it.”

He was barely aware of what she was saying. She could tell from the way his eyes flickered, hardly staying focused on the light. But when they saw her face, she watched some of the tension leave his face. Jughead couldn’t find her hand, fumbling around until he collapsed into the ground again. Everything was wet, sticky, and red. Even his hair was matted down from lying in his own blood.

With a deep breath, Betty pulled. He screamed with agony, fangs and nails pushing out in fear response. She felt his talons curl and pierce through her skin, but still she pulled until the sickening pop of the steak exiting his chest reverberated around their little apartment bathroom. He shot forward with a gasp, clawing in desperation for anything to help ground him. It reminded her of the way a feral dog might dig in the garbage for a scrap of food.

His wounds were healing slowly. She could barely make out the stitching of his muscles under the hole in his shirt. The wood clattered to the ground as she held out her wound to him, pressing it frantically to his lips.

“Drink,” she begged. “Jughead, drink.”

He latched on without complaint, but he was too weak to drink anymore than enough to help speed up his healing. Already she could feel him starting to collapse against her. But he couldn’t fall asleep, not until she figured out what had happened to him.

“Hey. Hey, Juggie, hey. Eyes here,” she said softly, moving his head so he was staring up at her again. He squinted in the harsh fluorescents but seemed to stay focused on her. “Who hurt you. Tell me who hurt you.”

It took him a minute, but finally the thoughts must have become less blurred as she reached out to smooth his hair. “Hunter. I think. New. I…Betty, I…”

The only sound in the room were his wheeze and there was a very real feeling of her heart shattering into a million pieces. Jughead, poor Jughead who had never wanted to hurt, made it his whole life in the Serpents without taking another life, had been forced to kill to save himself that night. She could hardly imagine the pain he was going through, and the only place she could put the blame was on her shoulders. She had ruined him. Hurt him. Destroyed him. Broken him down to the very thing she wanted to keep him from.

“You did it to save yourself,” she said softly, trying to keep him strong and awake for just a few minutes longer, until she was satisfied that he was not shaking anymore. “It’s okay. No one can blame you. Mother… Mother will forgive. She always does. She loves all her children, and She wants them to live.”

The wound was healing better now thanks to her blood, but even then the process was slow enough that it would take days, potentially weeks, to heal. Before Betty could stop herself, she felt the tears again.

_ How can you be so selfish to cry now, Elizabeth?  _ The voice in her head sounded so much like her mother.  _ You did this. You created this, and now you’re going to hurt him again? How could you? _

A gentle brush on her cheek startled her out of her pain. Jughead’s hand had reached out, fingertips tracing the tears away. His skin startled to sizzle, but he hardly seemed bothered by it. “It’s okay. It’s okay.”

He fell asleep again curled tight in her lap, breathing stilled as his body conserved energy to help heal. He was so good. So pure on the outside and in. Tears fell steady now, mingling with the blood on the floor. She could create the most beautiful paintings with this if only her mind were more ruined. Instead, Betty was sure the next few days would be spent ensuring Jughead was fed and cleaning up the mess that had been made. Later, she would bathe him, clean him up so he could rest in peace. But for now she just held him.

“Jughead. I love you.”


	2. 1999-2019

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to everyone who gave this a read! I know it's pretty angsty, but I promised you a happy ending and here it is! after just a tiny bit more suffering. It can't be a straight shoot, can it? Thank you to my beta, arsenicpanda, as always, for really encouraging me to keep going.
> 
> I had intended to post an update of another fic between these two chapters, but unfortunately life came at me fast and I had to have emergency surgery to remove all of my wisdom teeth. So that's fun. I'm currently in bed swollen beyond all belief, but I wanted to give you guys something so here is the conclusion of this fic! thank you again for reading <3

**Part 5: 1999**

“You know, Midge, you should be more content with what you have. You’re a lucky girl to have someone who cares enough to spend time with you like that.”

It was strange, how a simple sentence overheard at a coffee shop could linger so plainly in her brain. But for the last four days, Betty had been unable to shake what the young woman had said to her friend across the table. Maybe she should have just skipped the croissant altogether that morning. Obviously it would have been better for her mental health.

Doing the dishes, picking the weeds, writing up the report for her boss that was due next week, every little action was set to the tune of her words.  _ You should be more content with what you have. _ Was this Mother again? Speaking through code to help teach Her Earthly Daughter a lesson. There certainly were a lot of lessons She thought Betty needed to hear.

After the vampire attack ten years ago, she had never worked up the courage to follow through with what Josie had said. Once Jughead had fully healed, they packed up everything they owned in the dead of night and drove up as far North as they could get. Montana was not either of their ideal places to settle down, but it would have to do for the time being. Whatever hunters were in Texas surely could not have followed them where they were now. They took the long path, spending nearly a year on the road to ensure their safety.

Montana almost had the same rural charm that Riverdale had all those years ago. Somedays, Betty still wondered what their sleepy little town might look like now. But it was a terrifying thought to ever go back. To be faced with you and your lover’s tombstones, placed side by side, would be difficult for anyone.

She had found it one day in the newspaper, their obituaries. It seemed odd that they had been written at all, since both her parents had disowned her for absconding with a vampire and his had life sentences. But someone had paid to get their gravestones placed in the only cemetery in all of Riverdale. The little clipping sat folded in a hidden pocket of her purse, and sometimes she would unfold it and read them again.

_ Here Lies Elizabeth Ann Cooper and Forsythe Pendleton Jones the Third _

_ Be Safe Wherever the Journey May Take You _

_ You Are Eternally Missed _

The mysterious benefactor had chosen to remain anonymous, but every night Betty said a special prayer and crushed flowers for their long life and happiness. 

Most days, she was content to live how she did, as the roommate of a freelance writer with a bad coffee addiction. This suited them better than a married life, but it was easy to miss the heaviness of the metal around her finger. Sometimes she had to explain away the small dent in her skin, claiming that her mother had asked her to wear her ring after her father had died.

Lies. Lies. Lies. That was all their lives were now. Nothing but an endless list of lies and fake lives to convince others that they were nothing out of the ordinary. It was exhausting to keep it all in line. When they had been who, when they had done what, where they were before now. There were so many changed numbers, forgotten and scorned friends. Somedays it felt impossibly lonely even amongst the steadfast cold comfort of the vampire.

Ever since his brush with death, things had been softer between them. They still rarely spoke of the past, of their time before the curse had been cast, but at least now she felt like he was not a stranger living in her home. Perhaps one might even dare to call them friends again.

But maybe that was pushing it.

Betty knew that she would never be satisfied with something as simple as that, but for now it would do. Little by little she hoped to chip away at their woes and form something close to kinship again. She missed him. God, did she miss him.

The vampire hunter had been helpful in more than one way. Pushed by the knowledge that others would be after him soon, Betty began working at finding a cure for what she had caused. There were no rules to something like this. Transmuting a human into a mythic being was practically unheard of in their world. Only the most accomplished of witches had ever managed it, and most of them were not alive to share their knowledge. Even the tomes left were in broken languages that were long since dead, and no one had thought it was a good idea to leave pictures just in case.

Every day she felt like she was getting a step closer towards her goal, digging in the library for rusty books left by warlocks that the ears of mortals couldn’t read. Any witches she came across would get asked the same questions, as vaguely as she could manage as to not alert them to her predicament. There were pieces starting to come together, but at its core there was something she did not understand.

Sacrifice.

All magic must be given a sacrifice. There is a push and pull, a balance required. When she had cast the spell on Jughead, she had thought her blood would be enough, but that had not been the case. The more valuable gift given to Mother, the better the results of a difficult spell would be. She needed something in return to shift the world in a witch’s favor, and so often She worked in mysterious and ill-defined ways. The intentions of a caster could greatly alter even a simple textbook spell. Polly had once tried to summon a cat for herself and ended up with a small army of rodents instead. Often times magics was up to the whims of the Earth. Balance was hard, and some days it felt like progress involved a lot more backwards trajectory than forwards.

There was a knock at her study door, and she heard a familiar voice on the other side. “Betty? You’ve been locked in your room all day. How about you come out? It’s the one nice day of the year, and I want to stretch my legs a little bit outside.”

“Coming, Jug! Just let me clean up a little bit.”

She tucked the books away, hoping that his prying eyes would not get too curious. Betty didn’t want to give him false hope if there was no cure to be had. She worked silently, carrying the burden of perfection on her shoulders the way she had been taught the Coopers behaved, praying that he would never be forced to carry anything other than what was already weighing him down.

“What are you doing in there day after day? Should I be worried?” he teased.

Betty waved him off, smiling softly. At least she felt like there was a friendliness there between them, a repertoire that was not too painful. “Just stuff for work. You know how it is. My boss is an impossible hardass sometimes.”

“I still think it’s weird you keep pretending like you couldn’t just run that company for him. The hubris of the human man is baffling.”

“What about your hubris?” she teased.

He stiffened, looking away and refusing to meet her eyes. “I’m not a human, Betty, so I’m not sure if it counts. Vampires have their very own brand of hubris, I’m sure.”

There it was again, the casual degradation of his own humanity. Betty knew it was something he struggled with, but she had hoped the open wound would have healed even a little in the last few decades. Instead it seemed to only have gotten rawer.

It hurt her to know that Jughead did not view himself as human anymore. Whenever she looked at him she saw something so bright, a light that had always been there, had never faded. But he couldn’t even look in the mirror most days. With every passing year he pulled further and further away from that label and came to escape his life as a so-called monster.

Maybe monsters did drink blood and created bumps in the night that frightened the neighbors. But monsters didn’t stay outside in the rain to make sure that a little puppy was covered from the storm and then insist that they take him in.

Hot Dog was only six months old, but already the sheep dog was full of energy and loved to be walked on his leash. They went out nearly every night to help keep him from ripping up the furniture in their apartment. When Jughead picked up the leash, he barked in excitement, jumping around until Betty had to hold him tight just to get it clipped. They had to buy a special collar just to keep him from choking himself when he saw a bird and tried to run off to chase it.

There was a park not far from their house. It was convenient in the best of ways, mildly annoying in the worst. It was open late so they often could hear the excited screams of children long after the sun had set. It was a good thing they lived mostly as night owls.

Hot Dog stopped every few feet so he could sniff around and pee in any spots that seemed like they belonged too much to another dog. They let him do what he wanted, content to enjoy the fresh air. That was something about Montana that Betty appreciated. Even if the weather was difficult to manage, taking a deep breath and having her lungs filled with the intense aroma of pine was beautiful. She felt much more connected to Mother than she had in a very long time. Nature helped steady her mind and encourage her towards her search for a cure.

“Hey Mister!” A little girl with pigtails came running up, eyes wide as she stared at the puppy standing between them. Hot Dog immediately lit up, barking as he pulled on the leash, rubbing himself against her. “Can I pet your dog?”

Betty knew that Jughead was uncomfortable around children. He hadn’t been when they were younger, before it all, but the transformation had made him skittish. He was afraid to hurt them, break someone so fragile and innocent. Another vampire they had met had told them all about how delicious the younger ones were, and ever since then he was anxious. She knew that he would never be tempted like that. His heart was still good even if it was unbeating, but she helped him to avoid the situations just to keep his mind at ease.

“Um, yeah, sure. Careful, he licks. A lot.” Jughead sat himself on the bench so Hot Dog could be held close while he licked at the girls hands.

She giggled. “Thanks! He’s really cute! What’s his name?”

“Hot Dog.”

“Isn’t that a food? You’re so silly to name a doggie after food!”

When she laughed, so did he, relaxing a little bit even as the wind kicked up. Jughead smiled as she watched him. Even if he couldn’t see it, she knew it was there. That goodness, that humanity that would not so easily be shaken.

“Do you know where your parents are sweetheart?” Betty asked after a few minutes. No adult had come running up to help guide the little girl away, and that made her worry.

She paused, looking around, before shaking her head. “No. I saw the doggie and wanted to come pet him! Mama was on the phone so I couldn’t ask, and I wanted to come real, real bad. I don’t know where she went though.”

Jughead stiffened before her, but before Betty could stand and offer to help her find her mother, he had handed the leash over and took the little girls hand. “Come on. Let’s go find your mommy. I bet she’s worried sick about you.”

Betty watched them go with a blossom in her heart. Even if he couldn’t see it, she knew it was there, knew that there was beauty in his soul that defied any so-called monstrous change. It hurt her to know that he couldn’t see it in himself.

Sitting alone on a park bench, she remembered the day she was sure she had fallen in love. They were so young, and Polly had called her crazy for thinking someone born on the Southside was going to be the prince that swept her off her feet. But he had been. He still was. She had been alone, scared out of her mind, worried because she lost her mother when they were supposed to be taking a family trip down to the river. But there was no one in sight, and she’d been stumbling through the trees for what felt like miles to her tiny legs. Her skirts were a mess, and the little ribbon in her hair had been caught by a tree.

She screamed out, sobbing as she tried to shake the branch loose. This was her special hair ribbon, the one her daddy had bought her, and no mean tree was ever going to take it. Despite her flailing, it had yet to come loose, and she felt even more hopeless than she had before. But then, a savior, a prince wearing a crown, had come and loosened it for her.

_ Jughead smiled at her, front teeth missing as he held out his hand. “Come on. Let’s go find your mommy. I bet she’s worried sick about you.” _

It had been love at first sight. The handsome boy wearing ill-fitting swim clothes and a white tank top with more than a handful of holes. She had given him that ribbon with a kiss as thanks when she finally made her way back to her frightened family. Some days, Betty wondered if he still had it, or if it was another relic of the past lost to time.

Jughead came back to her after a few minutes, looking proud of himself in a way that only he could. Subtle, like he was afraid to even experience a positive emotion. But there was a smirk tugging at the corner of his lips that made her smile. Hot Dog jumped into his lap and gave him a kiss as a greeting.

“Yeah, I missed you too,” he said softly. “Ten minutes is a long time to be away, isn’t it?”

“That’s a million days in dog time you know,” Betty teased.

As they began the short walk back to their apartment, she couldn’t help but keep her eyes trained curiously on him. He could feel her staring and raised an eyebrow. “What’s so fascinating about me today, Betts?”

“Just that for someone who thinks they’re the furthest thing from human, you sure act like it a lot, helping little girls cross the road to get to their parents.”

He paused, looking away. “That’s different. Anyone would do that. It’s not like I could eat her surrounded by people anyway.”

“I’m not sure anyone would.”

The rest of the walk home was quiet. He told her he would be back before daybreak, hungry for food. He planned on stopping by the butcher shop before it closed in hopes of getting enough to last a few days. Animal blood wasn’t the best, but it was nutritional enough and kept him from stressing too much about the consuming another person or running Betty so low that she spent the next four days passed out in bed recuperating.

While he was gone, Betty went back to her notes. She had an early morning meeting tomorrow, but it could wait. Discovering the potential secret to a cure was much more important in her eyes than a few hours of sleep lost. Worst case scenario, she could make herself some tea from the herbs in her planters to help keep her awake tomorrow morning.

So little of it made sense. Most days felt futile as she threw the books to the side and laid her head against her desk. This was all dizzying madness. 

What would it be like after she found a way to reverse the spell? Would Jughead leave her, run away as far as he could, cursing her name for the pain he had endured? Or would they stay together out of habit, doomed to watch him grow old without her? Neither option felt good, but she knew this was not her choice to make. The least she could do for him was figure out the truth and present him with it. Then, it would be his decision to make, the one she owed him in the first place.

She kept digging tonight, adamant on finding something that might help break through the rut she was in. Nearly a decade of working on this reversal spell and she felt empty handed. There was only one book left from the library that she hadn’t had the chance to explore yet. It seemed like a last-ditch effort to dig through spells about curing disease. She flipped through idly, doubtful to find anything of use. But then, much to her surprise, she spotted something. 

_ How to Reverse an Accidental Curse _

_ The reversal of an accidental curse is much more difficult than that of a traditional curse. The intention of the original spell is often pure; however the caster’s abilities were not up to the caliber of the magic they were casting, and as such, Mother could not complete the magic as was wanted. To reverse such magic, the caster must be willing to give up what the original goal of the spell was. For example, a spell to remove warts resulting in multiple boils would involve the caster being willing to incur those warts again. _

_ Of course, this is only a minor example. There are much more intense spells that would require a higher sacrifice. I once came across a woman who had tried to cast a spell to help her mother pay rent to help her stay in her place of residence. Unfortunately, this resulted in many legal battles with the court due to counterfeit money appearing at her doorstep every day. Eventually the only course of action for the reversal was to sacrifice the home to Mother as recompense.  _

_ Not all accidental curses are necessarily curses, however, which is where the trickiness comes in. Mother is a very mysterious being, and sometimes Her intentions fused with yours can create something difficult to comprehend. If She is intent on seeing something occur in your life She deems is pivotal to your happiness and continued devotion, She may use one of your spells as a vessel for such a change. At first they can appear to be traditional curses, but they are not such. _

It hit her then, the truth to unraveling the spell. She had wanted so desperately to keep him that her magic had caused this as an unintended side effect. The only way to reverse it was to promise Mother that she would never see Jughead Jones again.

That night, Betty cried until her papers were stained with tears and the sun had started to rise.

**Part 6: 2009**

It was selfish. It was selfish and cruel and wrong. Betty could feel Mother in the recesses of her mind scolding her, but even then she only ever wavered, never fell. Every day she would look at the spell she’d spent five years perfecting, contemplating if today would be the day she finally told Jughead about its existence.

“Tomorrow,” she always said, and pushed it off to another day.

But there was always another tomorrow, and she knew without a push it would never come. There was always another reason, another excuse why tomorrow could wait. Maybe it was delusion, or fear, but she hoped with the passage of years that perhaps they would rebuild enough that he would be unwilling to make the sacrifice when she finally decided to tell him.

Betty had spent so much time trying to convince him that he was not the monster in disguise he so often thought himself to be. It was her. The wicked witch, corrupted by selfish desire, all but shunned by Mother. More and more these days the magic had to come from somewhere else: blood, quiet whispers in the night, crystals charged with the moon’s glow. Her connection to the Earth was wavering with her confidence in herself.

This was the path she had committed to. No matter where the road decided to end, she had to see it through. If nothing else she would stay committed and hope that the world, and Jughead, might one day understand the desperation that brought her to where she was now. There were no answered prayers at night, just the simple rumble of the trees. She could feel it, Her disappointment.

“I’m sorry, Mother,” Betty said every solstace, burning a candle and a lock of her hair as payment, retribution for her defiance. “I’m so sorry to have forsaken your teachings. Perhaps one day I can be your daughter again. Until then, I will do my best to live in the light as much as I am capable of.”

2009 was an exciting year. She had lived to see the turn of a century, including the panic that Y2K caused on the poor silly humans. Cell phones were getting so small she could hold them in her hand, and they had clipped the cord right from the wall. It was easy to keep in touch with people this way, which, like most things in her life, was both a blessing and a curse.

They hadn’t made many friends in Montana, but those they had were delightfully determined to stay in touch. With email and IM, it was becoming harder and harder to drop off the face of the Earth and reappear as completely different people in a brand new town. So they had gone to Canada.

Toronto wasn’t too far away from Riverdale. The big city let them hide a little better, and they were used to the temperature and atmosphere. Practically nobody asked who you were as long as you could pay rent and mind your own business. Neither of them would have to go through the complex work visa process thanks to a savings account Betty had been keeping for decades. She would frequently fake her own death and then claim to be the old woman’s daughter, coming to claim the money. Elizabeth Cooper the third hardly got any questions.

_ You look just like your mother _ , they said, and she would just smile, say thank you, and go on her way. The naiveté of humans was a beautiful thing she didn’t often enjoy exploiting. But to keep them safe and taken care of, she would do anything.

Toronto suited Jughead. He liked blending in with the crowd, wearing layers of clothes with no judgement. More and more he was exploring the world, interacting with people. Their current favorite local spot was a place called The Jumping Bean. It was a hole-in-the-wall coffee shop that served freshly baked pastries and enjoyed playing retro music on vinyl.

Betty liked the vibe of the place. It was quiet and calm, the perfect kind of shop to forget about all the struggles of the outside world and have the best vanilla latte in the entire hemisphere, maybe the entire world. When Jug was asleep, she would spend her time researching other possible cures in hopes of finding some other way to reverse the curse.

“Working on the same witchy things as usual, Cooper?” one of the baristas, Toni, asked. She was an alternative beauty with lots of piercings, pink hair, and a love of the 90s grunge aesthetic. She got along well with both Jug and Betty, sometimes being a little too friendly and poking her way into their purposefully secret, far-too-complicated-to-explain, private life.

“It’s not  _ witchy  _ stuff,” Betty corrected. “You know I don’t believe in all that fairytale stuff. It’s just for my cultural anthropology class.”

The lie worked well since she actually did attend the local university. Going to college had been a pipe dream once upon a time. Back in the 50s, even applying was enough to send a skeptical look her way. Jughead was always her biggest cheerleader. Even now that she was enrolled in a couple of onlines classes just to “develop her understanding of the world and learn to connect with others of our race on a deeper level,” he was making her tea at night to keep her awake while she studied for exams.

_ I’m going to be the first Jones ever to go to college, Betts. _

He had always said that, but no matter how many times she offered to help him, all she got was a sad smile and a shake of his head. Just another casualty in the chaos of her spell. This wasn’t fair, this secret wasn’t fair. There were so many things she was depriving him of every day she sat on it.

“Toni,” Bety started as her cup was being refilled with the daily tea brew. “Can I ask you a question?”

“Well you just did, but I’m a benevolent barista who’s still on the clock, so I’ll let you ask another one.”

Betty rolled her eyes and tried to figure out the best way to phrase it. Toni had a long standing girlfriend, a hard to handle hothead whose favorite nickname for herself was Cheryl Bombshell. They seemed like an out there combination, but maybe that was the best kind of person to ask for advice.

“Have you ever lied to Cheryl? Or kept something that was a really big, maybe life changing, secret?”

Toni blinked, surprised, and slid into the booth across from her. “Whoa. A little hot and heavy there, Cooper, especially for the first date. You don’t beat around the bush, do you? I guess I have once or twice. White lies or big lies that I thought would make things better. Secrets I kept because I was afraid to see how she might react to them.”

“And did she forgive you for those big lies, those secrets? When she knew you thought it was the right thing to do or you were afraid?”

Toni reached out and took her hand. “Betty, I learned a long time ago that lying and keeping secrets gets you in a world of shit. The truth is way hard, but the longer it sits there, the harder it gets to expose. People who are partners are partners in it all, not just what’s convenient and what makes you feel comfortable.”

She tried to swallow the meaning of Toni’s words. Of course she was right, but it was still a bitter pill. A conversation needed to be had, but she wasn’t sure how to admit the truth: that she had been keeping a secret for nearly ten years. Betty was afraid of the consequences. She was afraid of losing.

“But this is all purely hypothetical, right?” the barista teased.

Betty gave her a tight lipped smile, the Cooper signature grin she had been perfecting since birth, and nodded. “Of course. What sort of big earth-shattering secrets would I be keeping? And from who?”

“All I’m saying is, if you’re pregnant, I’m sure Jug would be fine with it.”

She sputtered, gagging on her tea. “I’m sorry, what? Jug and I are not like that!” Anymore. Not since she got so anxious keeping secrets all she could do to prevent herself from spiralling was tactful avoidance. “There is literally no way for me to be pregnant. Especially with a miniature Jughead.”

It likely wasn’t even a possibility, even if they were still sleeping together. Vampires and humans had the same anatomy at the core of it, but vampires had been magically altered so that blood was their only necessary source of nutrition. Come to think of it, she was pretty sure he had ejaculated inside of her (at least that’s what the necessary post coital clean-up spell indicated), but she hadn’t really wanted to carefully study the contents of his semen or send it in for testing. As far as she was aware, there was no record of any half-human (or half-witch) and half-vampire children. The closest thing would probably be a succubus, who had powers similar to witches and enjoyed leeching from humans, but they were demons, not the byproduct of an unlikely supernatural union.

By nature, Vampires were extremely reclusive. Very few of them lived with partners due to the inherently limited food supply, and even fewer with supernatural entities who weren’t like them. Because of that, there were a lot of misconceptions about their behaviors as well as data points that simply seemed non-existent. Betty had more than once contemplated writing down her experiences living with a vampire, but she had no way of knowing if his condition deviated due to the unusual nature of his creation. 

“I’m just saying, if it is at all a possibility, no judgements.” Toni cleared her thoughts away and brought her right back to reality. “We live in a modern world now. This isn’t the 50s. Premarital sex is all the rage, and the government can’t scare me straight.”

“A brave new world indeed,” she replied with a laugh.

“That book was shit and you know it.” Toni stood and gave Betty a gentle pat on the shoulder. “Whatever you’re worried about is going to be fine. I promise. It may not seem like it at first, but these things tend to have a way of working themselves out for the better. Even if it doesn’t seem like it.”

Feeling a little less afraid, and now equipped with coffee and a few of Jug’s favorite Jumping Bean pastries, Betty finally made her way home. The entire walk there was one giant pep talk, but as she unlocked her door she was starting to feel a little more hopeful. She had expected everything to be perfectly in its place, waiting to be turned upside down like the rest of the world with her truth. But instead she entered the room to find a mess. All the books she had gathered and notes she had written about the spell were scattered on every surface of the living room. Her heart sunk right into her stomach, and she started to shake. Jughead was standing there in the center of the hurricane, her final spell draft clutched tightly in his hands, staring at the paper like it had reached out and ripped his heart open. It didn’t look like he had eaten all day.

“Jughead,” Betty started slowly, taking a step towards him. He didn’t move, just stood there unwavering, eyes fixated on the words she had reworked again and again. “Let me explain. Please. Before you freak out let me explain.”

“I just went looking for a book. The one you said you were going to let me borrow. I was waiting for you go get home so we could go do something tonight so I thought I’d finally start reading it so you would stop hounding me to start and threatening me with spoilers. But I saw these still on your desk and I….I got curious.”

“You weren’t supposed to find out this way. You weren’t. I’m so sorry, Jughead.”

“You could have fixed me. You could have made it better and instead you just kept it a secret and made me suffer as a monster. Again and again. My life was miserable. Running around, feeding off of people.” He was angry, so angry that his voice was a steady calm. He had every right to be. When she couldn’t answer, he continued, “How long? How long have you been pretending this didn’t exist?”

She tried to swallow the knot in her throat. What came out when she finally had the courage to speak was barely a whisper. “Ten years since I first discovered there might be a way to turn you back into a human. I’ve been looking for longer. It’s been five since I finished the final draft of the spell, the one you’re holding now, and figured out what it would need to work. But Jughead, you have to understand, I didn't want to give it to you until it was finished, because what if I couldn’t make the spell work. But then…”

“But what, Betty? But what? You lied! You lied and kept secrets again! What happened to no more secrets, when you first told me you were a witch! You know how much I hate myself like this, how important even just the fucking hope I could change back would have been to me.”

He looked at her, shattered, betrayal evident in his eyes. She started to shake. Every part of her craved to reach out and touch him, call him back to her. But no words came out. Nothing seemed right. Nothing felt adequate.

“How could you do this to me?” Jughead whispered.

“Because I couldn’t lose you. Because I love you. Still. Because I’ll always love you. Because I wanted to pretend like you were ever going to love me again after everything I did to you.” Tears pricked at the edge of her eyes as she finally admitted years of pent up emotions. “You’re right. You’re right. This was your choice to make and I took it from you again. Because all I can do is take and take and take. I don’t know how you are ever going to be able to forgive me, but you need to know that if I had cast that spell we could never see each other again. One look at an old photo, or a phone call, or an accidental meet up in a parking lot and you’d switch back in an instant. There had to be a better way. There has to be. I know I hurt you and I messed up, but what about me, Jug? What about me?”

“What about you, Betty?” His voice was not as hostile as she thought his intention might have been. He sounded just as broken as she did. Never before had she seen a vampire cry, but watching him now as red streaked his cheeks, she felt her heart shattered into a million pieces.

“What about all the pain I’ve suffered, all the things I’ve had to endure. I can’t cry without watching you hurt, and now I have to choose to give you up forever because it’s the right thing to do. I don’t know if I will ever be happy after you go. But I have to! I have to, and it’s killing me inside to know that I am never going to get to be part of your life again. That I did everything, that I made us both suffer, for a dream that was doomed from the start.”

She swallowed, taking a deep breath to steady herself. “I know it might not seem believable right now, after everything you’ve seen, but I was going to tell you the truth today. I came home to tell you. I even brought pastries. Which I guess seem like a hollow gesture now. I can go, if you need me to.”

Not that she could go far. They were tied together still, a perpetual push and pull of pain. But maybe she could stay with their neighbor, or downstairs. Somewhere as far as she could go. Maybe Toni would let her sleep in the back room of the Jumping Bean.

“Or I could go to the store. I can grab everything I need, and I can cast the spell tomorrow. But I’m begging you, please, please just give me one more day with you. I know I don’t deserve it, but I can’t just let you go so suddenly.”

They stood there, face to face in suffocating silence for what felt like days. The only thing Betty could hear was the shakiness of her breathing as she frantically tried to calm herself down. Finally, Jughead spoke, “I’ll tell you my decision tomorrow.”

Tomorrow, like all the tomorrows before, never came, and suddenly tomorrow became a lot less terrifying.

**Part 7: 2019**

“I know being out and about in public isn’t exactly your thing, but I’m throwing a sock hop themed fundraiser, and I need you both to be there to support me! Please?”

Betty sighed, rubbing her head as she listened to her best friend’s pleas on the other side of the phone. Veronica Lodge was not the type of person who knew how to take ‘no’ for an answer. Stubbornness was important since she was, afterall, dating an alpha werewolf. Not that you would know it if you saw the way she got him to roll over backwards at a single bat of her eyelashes.

“I’m not sure, V. You know the 50s are sort of a rough spot for both Jughead and I since that’s when the whole turning thing happened. I could probably swing by for a little while, but I can’t promise that it would really be the type of thing Jug would enjoy.”

It was nice to have a person who understood the complexities of the Supernatural world. Veronica was a human, but she had been privy to the dark underground her whole life. Hiram Lodge, now currently locked behind bars for tax fraud and evasion, making her the sole heir to his entire fortune, was notorious to nearly all supernatural creatures as someone who liked to make deals and never follow through. You wanted blood, he could get it to you, but for a price so high it would likely cost you your life, only to get the lowest quality synthetic garbage you could get. 

  
Betty and Jughead were lucky that they had never run into him before, but that didn’t mean he didn’t have a reputation. Meeting Veronica after she’d moved into the apartment across the hall had been terrifying. They’d dodged her most days until Jug bumped into Archie Andrews on his way out of the house. Vampires and Werewolves had a natural disposition to argue, so Jug had prepared himself for a fight. One that never came. Instead, Archie gave him a sunny smile, shook his hand, and immediately began talking his ear off about his girlfriend.

Their relationship was complicated, maybe almost (almost!) as complicated as Jughead and Betty’s was. They technically weren’t supposed to be dating, as it was written in Veronica’s trust fund that she stay out of supernatural affairs, but they had a plan to get around that as soon as she turned twenty-five. The trust would legally be hers, and she could have Archie turn her into a werewolf. It was a commitment Betty had never seen be willingly undertaken by a human before, at least not one who wasn’t in extreme distress and despair, but if anyone could do it, it was her best friend. She was the human embodiment of a firecracker, and everywhere she stepped lit up with sparks. She was an ever-present reminder that maybe even the most rotten parts of the world could grow something beautiful.

Betty knew how important this fundraiser was going to be. It also marked the day of Veronica’s 25th birthday, a large celebration where she would show Archie and her to the world as an official couple. She could already see the stir it would cause in the papers, especially given that Archie had once been her father’s former bodyguard. (It was smart to keep supernatural people around when you worked in that kind of business.)

She knew she should be there to support her best friend and Jughead should be too. Despite every genetic predisposition to hate each other, he and Archie were the best of pals. They went out drinking too late, where Archie would forget that while alcohol may affect him slowly, it didn’t get Jughead at all, and he would have to be carried home stumbling through the streets before passing out on Veronica’s couch.

The two of them were the Godsend that Betty hadn’t known they had needed. They were a touch of humanity, a reminder to smile, and in some ways the very goal that she so often chased after. Archie was a so-called monster the same as Jughead in many ways. Werewolves were notorious for going on rampages during the full moon that could potentially end in a massacred town of people. He kept a lot of those urges at bay with suppressants the Lodge corporation had been developing and a clever storage unit that Veronica locked up tight when his more aggressive side came out to play.

Archie had been turned in high school too, though more recently than either of them. He was the quarterback in a small town during the 1980s. He’d gone hiking one day in the woods and ended up stumbling upon a slumbering pack of wolves. Fortunately for him, or perhaps unfortunately, they’d been kind enough not to just eat him alive, but instead turn him. There went the professional football dreams, but brought in an entirely different world of the strange and bizarre. It was a story that helped to connect him and Jughead on a deep level.

“Please. Please, he has to come. Tell him it’s my birthday! Wait no, he won’t care. Tell him that Archie would really like to see him there, and then describe in detail those sweet brown puppy dog eyes of his.”

Betty laughed. “You want me to emotionally blackmail Jughead to get him to come to your birthday bash fundraiser?”

“It’s a fundraiser for the library. That should be his thing in the first place. I know the theme isn’t ideal, but my party planner insisted.” She paused, and Betty could practically hear the wicked grin on the other end of the phone. “Think of it as the prom you never got.”

“Veronica! You are not using this as a matchmaking session. You know that things are…complicated between Jughead and I.”

“Honestly, B, I think it’s only complicated because you two are making it complicated? You know I used to think Archie and I were too complicated. I’m human, he’s not. We’d never work. But then he made me open my eyes to the fact that love is one of the least complicated things you can be a part of.”

“Is he holding cue cards in front of you right now? Are you feeling okay? Say ‘watermelon’ if you’re being held hostage by cupid.”

“Haha. You’re a real comedian.” Veronica paused. “Is Cupid real?”

Betty laughed, shaking her head as she started molding the delicate fondant petals for the birthday cake she was making. She had been begged to participate as more than just a guest, and, well, it was nice to use the baking skills she’d been honing for decades. “Not in the cherubic way you imagine him. There’s entities of love, but they’re offshoots of Mother. They’re all part of Her. Everything is.”

She groaned. “God this is going to give me a headache one day. How does Archie keep it all straight?”

“I don’t know if you’re aware of this, V, but I don’t think he even really thinks about anything. He probably knows less than you do. Archie’s the kind of guy who’s just along for the ride most of the time.”

“Oh how right you are. Anyway, all I’m saying is that it might be nice for you and Jughead to move past all the bullshit for the day and just enjoy something you never got to have. Don’t you think? I know things are still difficult between you two, but didn’t you say that after he learned the repercussions of the spell he hasn’t brought it up since? Obviously that means he still has feelings for you, otherwise he would have packed up his things and wished you farewell as he dramatically road off a train into the ocean or whatever dramatic people like him do. He’s just been so emotionally congested for long that he doesn’t understand what to do. Trust me, I know what I’m talking about. I’m the same person who got up in the middle of Archie telling me he loved me and tried to crawl out of my own window. Feelings are hard for people who don’t want to be feeling them. And Jughead, from what you and Archie have both told me and what I’ve seen, is that kind of person too. He doesn’t know how to cope with still being in love with you. Or you can finally agree to let me set you up on a date with a very handsome bachelor from Archie’s pack. It’s completely up to you.”

Leave it to Veronica to turn her own birthday into a  _ Get Betty Laid Party _ . Rolling her eyes, Betty set the two flowers she had managed to make aside so they could dry before she painted them. “For the last time, I’m not going on a date with someone named Reggie Mantle.”

“I’m not asking you to go on a date with him, I’m asking you to sleep with him, these are two very different things.”

“I’m hanging up on you now.”

“No no no! Wait. At least promise that you’ll think about what I said, okay? I love you so much, B, and I just want you to find the happiness you deserve, to stop beating yourself up about a mistake you made almost a whole century ago. No one deserves to have that kind of pressure on them constantly. Sure, the spell was a setback, but from everything you’ve told me, there’s something really special there between you and Jughead. I just don’t want to see you give up on it at the final stretch.”

Maybe she was right. Maybe Veronica knew a little bit more about forming a relationship that wasn’t all mixed up than Betty did. The night after the fight, Jughead practically pretended like it hadn’t even happened, that the spell didn’t exist and the night before was nothing but a bad dream. She had been so jumpy for weeks following, but eventually she realized he was doing his best to ignore the whole thing entirely. For years she’d been sitting on it, confused as to why he would do such a thing when he wanted so badly to be human again.

It seemed stupid to get her hopes up now, after everything, that there might still be a romantic future in front of them. The very thought made her toes curl with excitement, but she tried desperately to push it away before it implanted too deeply in her heart and started to bloom.

“Fine. I’ll think about it. Will that make you happy?”

“Perfect. By the way, I’ve already sent the dress I want you to wear over to your house. It should be there in a few hours. Make sure to put it in before the party this weekend! Thanks for agreeing to come! Kisses!”

“Veronica wait! I--” The line was already dead, nothing but the loud hum of the dial tone on the other end. She groaned, trying to figure out how she could manage to convince Jughead to come with her to the birthday bash of the century. She felt like she was in high school again, watching him in the hallway, writing him little love notes to stick into his locker, all because she wanted his attention.

A sock hop sounded like a lot of fun though, a prom that she had never gotten to experience before. Maybe with a little begging she could convince Jughead to come with her, even as just a friendly sort of date, to celebrate the start of Archie and Veronica’s happily ever after.

“He’s not going to turn her at the party, right?”

Betty flopped herself in his swiveling desk chair with a raised brow. “Do you really think Veronica Lodge of all people is going to let Archie bite her in the middle of a group of all her peers and let her probably million dollar dress get dirty? Besides, there’s going to be a lot of people there who don’t know about people like us. I’m pretty sure if I flew us there on a broom people would get suspicious.”

“You can’t even fly a broom. The last time you tried, you crashed.”

“That was twenty years ago, and I bet if I wanted to, I could do it now!”

He laughed, a gentle smirk on his lips as he kept teasing. “Oh I’m sure. Does that mean you’ll get us there in style?”

“Well I might if you--wait, does that mean you’ll go?” she asked, hopeful.

Jughead nodded despite the fact that he didn’t look utterly thrilled at the prospect. “Yeah, sure. I owe it to him after he got one of his pack guys to stop following me around every time I went to the store and trying to start a fight when I just wanted to grab some snap peas. It can be my thanks for all the times he’s saved my ass.”

“What about all the times you’ve saved his ass?”

“To be repaid at a later date, dear Elizabeth. And when I collect, it shall be in full, with interest.” He smirked and winked, watching her laugh. It felt strangely intimate being this close to him in his room, and she couldn’t help but be excited at the prospect of the future. Maybe there really was a chance for them to be.

The evening of the party, Betty spent a little too long in the bathroom, fluffing the bottom of her petticoat and readjusting the pink straps of her dress. It was cute, a little more modern than the retro clothes she had been used to, but the fabric was soft and felt like clouds on her skin. The pretty pink color matched with her little kitten heels. She even dusted on a little blush and painted her lips pink. After much debate, she pulled her hair out of the ponytail and gave it a shake before putting a few shiny pins in it. Here she was: the night she had always wanted.

It seemed so silly, but she felt like a little girl again, so young and full of hope and naiveté. Maybe just for one night she could forget it all and be that person again. They could be them again, before the worst of the worst.

She stepped out of the bathroom still fiddling with her dress. He was standing there, leaning against the doorframe, that old familiar leather jacket around his shoulders. It wasn’t the one with the Serpent insignia she was so used to on the back, but it reminded her of it all the same. It was easy to remember the way he felt, always so warm under the leather, smelling like cigarettes and soap.

“Hey,” Betty said softly. “You look nice. Are you ready to go? I think Veronica’s already got that stupid limo she booked for us on the way.”

Jughead didn’t stop staring at her, not for a long time. Just the gentleness of his gaze made her squirm and look away. Finally, he spoke, “You look really beautiful, Betty. I’m ready whenever you are.”

She couldn’t help but grin, feeling the flush of her cheeks. Maybe they were both going to pretend for the night. When he reached out to take her hand, she was even more surprised, but delighted. In the limo, he sat close beside her, fiddling with the up-and-down mechanisms of the window. She didn’t mind the silence. It wasn’t the suffocating kind she was used to with him. It was something better, softer, sweeter.

“Betty...what color would your dress have been at prom?”

The question surprised her. Normally Jughead never talked about the past. It was still a raw wound he didn’t like to acknowledge. She thought for a minute what her answer should be before she decided it was time to start telling the entire truth again. “Green, because it reminded me of your jacket. And you always told me green looked so good with my eyes.”

“I already bought the corsage,” he admitted, still turned away, but she clung to every word. “It was white because I figured that, no matter what, white would go with what you got. And white was…. It was you. Pure and beautiful and innocent. But maybe not so innocent. I don’t know, I just thought you would have liked it.”

“I did. I still do.”

Cautiously, Betty reached out, tangling their hands together. He didn’t move, didn’t flinch, just let her rest her hand in his.

“I have something for you. I’m not sure it goes with the outfit but I hope so.” He pulls out a small ribbon from his pocket, and Betty immediately recognizes it as what she had given him so many years ago. 

“You kept it,” she said, surprised as she ran it through her fingers. “You really kept it.”

Jughead shrugged and reached around to tie it in one of the curls of her hair. It wasn’t as intricate as she would have done, but it was enough to make her smile. “Of course I did. It’s yours.”

“Thank you, Jug. Really.”

Veronica’s party was just as elegant and over the top as Betty had imagined it was going to be. There was a live band playing what she remembered as every song from the top of the chart back in the 50s. It brought in a wave of nostalgia. There were balloons, decorations, beautiful flashing lights all over the room. People dressed up and dancing. A few of the older people were leading a small jive instructional in the corner of the room to a younger generation. It made her smile.

They were caught almost as soon as they walked into the door, Veronica throwing her arms tightly around her best friend. “You made it! You’re a little late, but I figured you would be, since the sun needed to come down and everything. But you’re in time for an amazing party. And a delicious cake.”

“I’m glad to hear it,” Betty laughed, holding her close. “When do you guys make your debut as a couple?”

“In a few minutes on the dance floor. They’re going to play a slow song, and we’re going to start it off. I think people have their suspicions, but everyone who isn’t aware of the underground thinks it’s just cute. Which, mind you, it is.”

Archie beamed from beside her and pulled her as close as she would let him. “Thanks for coming, guys. It means the world, seriously.”

“How could I miss you committing your life to a human harpy?” Jughead teased.

Veronica reached out, stepping on his toes with a delicate grin. “Watch your mouth, Vamphead, this is my birthday bash, remember?”

“Vamphead. Extremely original. Anyone ever offer you a book deal?”

The teasing was nice. It felt something next to normal, even as Archie grabbed Veronica by the waist and escorted her to the dance floor. When the song started to play, she felt Jughead’s hand inch towards hers again, giving it a gentle squeeze and tug. Surprised, she followed his lead out onto the dance floor.

They were awkward at first, trying and failing several times to get in sync with one another, until finally Jughead gave in and let her start to lead. She relaxed against him, slowly turning them around the dance floor. They still weren’t in perfect time, but this felt better than anything that had happened in a long time.

“I think that I owe you a lot of apologies Betty,” Jughead began. When she opened her mouth to speak he shook his head. “I took out a lot of my anger on you, again and again after you had already admitted to your mistakes. I was just so angry all the time, and it wasn’t fair to you. You gave everything you had, just like I did, to be with me. I wish we had talked about things before. I wish you had come to me and asked because I would have said yes. I was upset about losing my family, but I think more than anything I was upset that it wasn’t a decision I got to make. But you’ve already said you’re sorry. I’m not saying this again to make you feel bad, because it’s my turn to be the one apologizing. When I learned about the spell, I thought you were keeping secrets again, lying to me, not letting me make decisions again, and it hurt. It reopened all those old wounds, and I lashed out. But when you told me what it meant, giving up you, I realized that was something I couldn’t risk. 

“I sat in my room for hours just reevaluating everything I had said and done, asking myself if I wanted this, if I wanted freedom if it meant giving up the one person in the world I had always wanted forever with. And we had it. We have it. So why was I so afraid to take it?”

Betty held on tight, taking a shaky breath. Her tears started to roll down her cheeks again, but the material of his suit absorbed them before the could do much damage. He reached out, brushing the tears away before she could stop him. His fingers shook as it ate away a small circle in his skin, but he didn’t seem bothered, didn’t even flinch.

“I guess I made you cry again.”

“I made you cry so much,” she replied. This wasn’t his fault, not all on his own. They had worked together to create this mess, and they would have to work together to dig their way out of it. Slowly but surely. “I made you hurt so much. I only wanted to help, but I was so reckless back then because of my fear. If I could go back, I would have asked. But there is no going back now. Only going forward. And I want my forward to be with you. Even if it takes us a long time to get back to where we were.”

Jughead laughed, running a hand through her curls. “You’re not a monster, Betty. Neither of us was. We were young and stupid and hurting each other. And I know I’m going to hurt you again, but in the future we’re going to figure it out. I won’t lash out from anger, and you won’t keep secrets. There are decisions we have to make together and I’m willing to make them.”

“I know.” It felt good to finally say it to herself, to ease all the years of self-hatred off her shoulders and throw them into the ocean. “I know. I just wanted to help you. That doesn’t make me a bad person. It doesn’t make me a beast. It makes me a human, a witch, a person. The same as our anger. I want to start working on us again.”

“We’ve got forever don’t we? No better place to get started than now?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I would really like that, Jughead.”

“I know. I would too.”

When he kissed her, it was like her entire world had opened up again. She could feel Mother singing in her heart as magic bubbled in her veins again. Right as she was about to pull him close to deepen the kiss, the trumpets started to play (because of course there were trumpets on Veronica’s birthday), and she and Archie began descending the stairs arm in arm. Jughead rolled his eyes, pulling her close so she could feel the warmth of his leather against her skin. “They’re ridiculous.”

“Maybe. But they’re glad we’re here to support them. Just like they’ve been supporting us. Go head and smile, Jughead, I promise it won’t kill you. Pretty much nothing can anymore.”

He didn’t stop smiling the entire night.

**Author's Note:**

> Please let me know all thoughts and feelings! I'm really interested to see how you feel about something a little outside the box, even for me. Follow me on tumblr @tory-b


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